'Testing is a very good strategy if only symptomatic people are transmitting the disease.' 'Here asymptomatic people, with minimum, trivial symptoms, are transmitting too.' 'Testing, treating, tracing contacts and quarantining them -- yes, it will work up to a certain extent.' 'But more important is physical distancing, hand hygiene, cough etiquette and cocooning, protecting with reverse quarantining the most vulnerable people, senior citizens, people with other major medical problems.' 'To me, that makes much more sense.'
'China was a relationship from which Mr Modi had expected the most it seems.' 'It showed in a string of summits, and somewhat breathless celebration of Xi Jinping.' 'It was hasty and simplistic,' observes Shekhar Gupta.
A day after two new cases of novel coronavirus that included one from Delhi were reported, the health ministry on Tuesday said six cases with "high-viral load" were detected during sample testing in Agra and these people have been kept in isolation. The six have been kept in isolation at Safdarjung Hospital in Delhi and their samples are being sent to NIV, Pune for confirmation.
Aseem Chhabra introduces us to the best of Berlinale.
A summary of sports events and persons who made news on Friday.
Only he, with his tremendous political capital and personal stature, can pull it off, observes B S Raghavan, the veteran civil servant.
Did Xi deliver a message to Modi at Mamallapuram, which though couched in a velvet glove was time-bound? What was that message? It is clear Indian/Israeli/US spy satellites would not have missed detecting Chinese troop movements towards the Ladakh-Tibet frontier. Then why did some important functionaries in the Government of India choose to only ask the Russians about this in April 2020? Was Russian reassurance of Chinese troop movements being part of a routine exercise the reason that the Leh-based XIV Corps did not mobilise itself for its annual summer exercises near the LAC? A fascinating excerpt from Iqbal Chand Malhotra's new book Red Fear: The China Threat.
'At the same time, if we are a little careless, we will run into trouble. No doubt about that.'
Indian tennis ace Sania Mirza and her Swiss partner Martina Hingis equalled the record for the longest women's doubles winning streak on Wednesday by advancing to the WTA Sydney International semi-finals with a straight set triumph.
Mamata should travel to China to see how the Chinese railway system is expanding, says T N Ninan.
After the Kerala government declared the coronavirus outbreak as a 'state calamity', as the three positive cases were detected from Thrissur, Alapuzha and Kasaragod, tourism minister Kadakampally Surendran admitted that the sector had suffered a hit. The sector had aggressively launched promotional advertisements in the domestic and international markets after the floods to revive the sector. However, all the efforts took a beating, with mass cancellations of hotel bookings after the outbreak of the infection in the state was reported.
'India does not have the wherewithal to successfully manage a full blown covid-19 crisis,' warns Vivek Gumaste.
The Union health ministry said West Bengal and Himachal Pradesh reported a casualty each on Monday, taking the total number of deaths to nine in the country due to COVID-19.
Indian tennis ace Sania Mirza and her Swiss partner Martina Hingis lifted their ninth title together this year beating the Spanish pair of Garbine Muguruza and Carla Suarez Navarro to clinch the WTA Finals women's doubles trophy, in Singapore, on Sunday.
The meeting with Xi is being held amid the ongoing trade war between the United States and China.
Summary of sports events and persons who made news on Wednesday
Extending their unbeaten record, India's Sania Mirza and Switzerland's Martina Hingis lifted their eighth trophy of the season and fourth in a row, winning the WTA China Open.
'Premature lifting of the lockdown will spread the disease from asymptomatics, and those undetected, to the whole community, ushering in prolonged misery, preventable and avoidable deaths, famine and social unrest,' warns Dr Debashish Danda.
China had been trying hard to enter the Indian market, without opening its own to Indian products. There is an economic crisis in India-China relations that the Chennai Connect barely scratched the surface, points out Srikanth Kondapalli.
The plant, which will become operational in 50 months time, will be a joint venture between China's leading Wuhan Iron and Steel Group and the Guangxi regional administration's agency for the management of state assets. The setting up of the steel plant is a part of major moves by China to reorganise its steel sector to make it more competitive.
The Union Health ministry put the number of positive cases at 82, eight more since Thursday night, which includes the woman and a 76-year-old man from Karnataka who became the country's first coronavirus fatality besides 17 foreign nationals, Health Ministry officials said.
'Open conflict would be a disaster for both China and India.'
The deliberations focused on bringing down tension along the disputed borders and ways to bridge the trust deficit.
An easy, simple, quick and cost-effective screening test for cancer of the colon, lung, stomach and bladder, developed by medical scientists of China's Wuhan University, has found its way to Kolkata.
'India is still hierarchical, but not as much as Japan and people appreciate a flat working culture,' Charles Frump, managing director, Volvo Cars India, tells Pavan Lall.
American tennis ace Venus Williams has entered the top ten of latest WTA ranking following her victory in the Zhuhai Masters in China.
The top seed was forced to dig deep into her vast reservoirs of experience to stave off Pliskova's challenge and emerge a 7-5, 7-6(6) winner against the gutsy Czech.
Twice Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova said on Friday she would do everything she could to return to tennis after suffering a hand injury in a knife attack that will keep her out of the sport for at least six months. Kvitova was wounded on Tuesday when she fought off an intruder at her home in the Czech Republic, damaging all the fingers on her left playing hand. The world number 11 addressed the media directly for the first time on Friday after an operation to repair the tendons in her hand and was determined to get back to playing.
Top seed and defending champion Roger Federer battled past in-form Russian Daniil Medvedev 6-4, 4-6, 6-4 to reach the last-16 at the Shanghai Masters on Wednesday.
In his address at the Plenary session of the 18th SCO summit in Qingdao, Modi coined an acronym 'SECURE' which he explained: 'S' for security for citizens, 'E' for economic development, 'C' for connectivity in the region, 'U' for unity, 'R' for respect of sovereignty and integrity, 'E' for environment protection.
'What Trump and Kim have demonstrated is that leaders need not remain prisoners of the status quo and they can, by showing the necessary will and courage, break out of the hang-ups and constrictions of the past and carve out a new pathway for themselves,' says B S Raghavan.
Former world number one Garbine Muguruza was beaten 7-5, 6-4 by Aryna Sabalenka in the China Open second round on Tuesday while an ailing Jelena Ostapenko lost 6-0, 6-0 to Wang Qiang.
'It doesn't look as if any sensible, worldly wise, person is in charge in China.' 'If at all anybody is in charge, it can only be a bunch of bumpkins of whom Xi has become a puppet,' observes B S Raghavan, the veteran civil servant.
'Our drains are not filled with bodies, our hospitals not run out of beds.' 'That good news, or absence of expected bad news, is the truth that so many in the international community, and also within India, seem unable to handle,' notes Shekhar Gupta.
World No 1 Serena Williams was handed the best possible draw for her WTA Finals title defence with the 33-year-old American grouped with two injury doubts and avoiding the in-form players.
Official sources said the two leaders will meet for around four to six hours for the 'agendaless' talks
'Around April 1-2, both states had similar number of cases, around 300.' 'The number of deaths in Kerala were 2 and in Maharashtra around 10. But the two graphs have diverged after that.'
'She used to call me every day to check whether I was all right. You know how mothers are!'
'While high-level interventions may help smoothen inter-State relationships, they cannot fundamentally change the alchemy of such relationships, which are firmly rooted in mutual benefits and mutual interests,' points out Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Two-time Commonwealth Games gold medallist Saina Nehwal continued her impressive run, progressing into the women's singles semi-finals with a straight-game win over unseeded Korean Lee Jang Mi at the Asia Badminton Championship in Wuhan, on Friday.
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